Chapter 5
Damian
By the time we got back to my house, the place had stopped feeling like home.
It felt like a command center.
Men at every door. Screens lit across the dining room table. Darius with two laptops open and a wire in his ear. Tone pacing because stillness made him worse. Rico standing by the fireplace with the Vega box unopened at his feet.
Tammy sat at the table with the gold queen in front of her.
She had not cried.
That worried me more.
I set the Brooks box beside her. "We open everything carefully. Darius copies the flash drive without connecting it to my main system. Tone, find Vince's niece. Rico, call every old contact tied to Savannah."
Tammy looked up. "And me?"
"You rest."
Her face went flat.
Tone turned away like he wanted no part of the incoming argument.
"Try again," Tammy said.
I lowered my voice. "You just found your name in a hidden room."
"I found half a birth certificate and more questions than answers. Rest is not one of them."
My phone rang before I could answer.
Unknown.
Everybody went quiet.
I put it on speaker.
Bishop's voice came through like he had been sitting in the room with us the whole time. "You opened the room."
I stared at the phone. "You wanted us to."
"I wanted the right people to. There is a difference."
Tammy leaned closer to the phone. "Where is Maya?"
A soft laugh. "Still alive because I allowed it."
Vince made a broken sound from the corner. I had brought him in because fear talked better under supervision.
Bishop continued. "Bring me the Brooks box, the flash drive, and the queen."
"No," I said.
"Then Keisha becomes a widow twice. Kira becomes a lesson. Maya becomes a memory."
Tammy stood so fast her chair scraped the floor.
I looked at her.
She looked back.
Not fear.
Decision.
"What do you really want?" she asked.
The line went quiet.
Then Bishop said, "The girl belongs to the King. She was born with a debt."
"I don't belong to anyone," Tammy said.
"Everyone belongs somewhere. You just have not remembered where."
The call ended.
I wanted to throw the phone through a wall.
Instead, I set it down because Tammy was watching me. Because she had told me to think before I moved even before she knew that was the thing I needed most.
Darius lifted his head. "I found something. Vince's niece. A warehouse camera picked up a van two hours ago near the old meatpacking district. Same plate from Valentino's alley feed."
Vince looked like his knees might give out.
Tammy grabbed her purse.
"No," I said.
"Damian."
"Maya is bait."
"Then we move with a plan."
"You don't go at all."
Her eyes flashed. "That girl is sixteen. Bishop is using her because men keep deciding girls are useful when they're scared. Do not ask me to sit here with a queen on the table and pretend I don't understand what that feels like."
That stopped me.
Not because I liked it.
Because she was right.
I looked at Rico.
"You take Tammy to Aunt Denise's. Find Evelyn's boxes. If the Brooks box led here, her house has the rest. Darius and I get Maya."
Tammy opened her mouth.
I stepped closer. "Please."
The word changed the room.
Maybe because I did not use it often.
Maybe because she heard what was under it.
She touched my chest once. "Come back."
"Always."
Her eyes told me she did not believe in always.
Neither did I.
But I meant it anyway.